Tuesday, October 21, 2014

When Will It End?

Where the Manhunt is
Happening

For well over a month, Pennsylvania State Police, along with
federal agents, have been searching for a gunman who is accused of ambushing a
PSP barracks in Northeastern Pennsylvania and shooting two state troopers, one
fatally. Eric Frein has been evading hundreds of law enforcement officers by
hiding in the woods of northern Monroe County since September 12, the night the
shootings took place. Frein grew up in this area, and is a self-styled
survivalist who knows his way around this rugged terrain.

It seems he is for the most part hiding in two of the
northernmost townships in our county, evading capture by hiding in the many
nooks and crannies available to him. Simply disappearing into the thick
undergrowth offers concealment. Many springs and streams are available for him
to cross and re-cross, throwing trained tracking dogs off his trail repeatedly.

Now, it appears he has slipped past a perimeter the LEOs
believed they had him contained in, and has moved slightly south, nearer “civilization.”
It is reported a local woman encountered him Friday night not far from a large
school campus. Frein attended Pocono Mountain East High School near the small
village of Swiftwater. On the campus of that part of the Pocono Mountain school
district, there are actually four schools. They were all open yesterday, and
things got a little dicey. After consideration, the district has opted to close
all schools today. They were closed for a week when the manhunt first began.

The campus is not far from a huge complex, Sanofi Pasteur,
the largest manufacturer of vaccines in the United States. What began in 1897
as the Pocono Biological Laboratories was bought first by Connaught in Canada
and eventually Sanofi. When Sanofi-Aventis was created, it became the third
largest pharmaceutical company in the world, and Sanofi Pasteur now covers some
500 acres with 44 buildings. It fronts on a major highway, PA State Route 611. Across the highway
is the Swiftwater Pennsylvania State Police Barracks.

When I first moved to Monroe County from Cincinnati, over
forty years ago, the county was very different. Population exploded here from the late nineteen sixties into the eighties, and again after 9/11. School districts were
hard pressed to keep up with the influx of students, and a number of new
schools were built in all four Monroe County districts.

That has changed. Population growth slowed and began to
reverse. The problem the districts now have is lack of a tax base to cover
their operating expenses. Schools have closed as more people have left the
area. The once thriving resort industry has almost disappeared. Many of the old
resorts have been abandoned. If you’ve been following the manhunt, you may have
seen images of LEOs searching through the huge, once grand Buck Hill Inn. Or a
resort called Penn Hills. There are a number of others. All these empty
buildings ─ hiding places for a fugitive. There are still weekend homes. There
are many empty buildings all through these hills and woods.

Frein, a lone fugitive, has an advantage. He knows the area
better than the LEOs do. He’s one person, he can move fast and wherever he
wants. I’m not sure I’m expressing this too well, but it seems perhaps tactical
problems may be hindering the LEOs. It takes time to determine where they need
to deploy and what they need to do even before they begin to pursue him. It
does seem he may have been spotted a couple of times yesterday; one report was “near
the Swiftwater Post Office.”

There is concern that he may be working his way to
the PSP barracks on Route 611, which seems foolhardy but also may have been his
intention all along. It would be another strike at his declared foe. There is
no way of knowing what’s going on in his head, of course, or what the endgame
will be.

Sanofi Pasteur is a secure facility and it's my understanding that it is heavily guarded. Its' over two thousand employees must have I.D. to enter the
facility. It’s hard to comprehend how immense it is. Driving that far up 611 is
something I seldom do, but each time I’m impressed with Sanofi Pasteur as I
pass it. It’s hard to believe how much it has grown over the past forty years.
And it definitely indicates how varied our county is … just behind Sanofi the
woods begin, and stretch all the way to the New York state line. And east to
New Jersey.

Some of the people living in those woods are descendants of families who settled this area more than two hundred years ago. “Locals,” they call
themselves, with understandable pride. I’ve lived here for only forty-some
years. My sons grew up here, still live here and think of themselves as locals,
but they aren’t … they were both born in Cincinnati, Ohio. Heading north on 611
and turning right just beyond the tremendous complex that is Sanofi, a drive of less than a mile takes the driver from one world to another; both are part of twenty-first
century Monroe County.

All of us who live here want Eric Frein caught today.
Yesterday would have been better, but every morning we hope it will be today.
It seems to me he may have just made it a much more dangerous game.

About Me

After growing up in the unique town of Oak Ridge, Tennessee, I went to the College-Conservatory of Music in Cincinnati as a vocal performance major. I met and married a tenor and we had three children, and moved to the Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania in 1971 where I established a private voice studio and began directing community and high school musical productions. While in Cincinnati I had the good fortune to be on the administrative staff of the Edgecliff Academy of Fine Arts and the Cincinnati Shakespeare Festival.

Here in the Poconos, I directed over eighty musicals from 1984-2015, and had the privilege of seeing many of my private voice students become teachers, professional performers, and most of all, find the joy in using their singing voices.

In 2013 I fulfilled a lifelong dream and wrote my first ever book, a novel entitled HOW I GREW UP, My second novel, ELI'S HEART, was published in June, 2014. My third novel, YOU ARE MY SONG, was released in January, 2015. Novel number four, JAMIE'S CHILDREN, was released in July, 2016, and MEMORIES OF JAKE in March, 2017. MAN WITH NO YESTERDAYS is scheduled to be released on Nov. 11, 2017. My first non-fiction book, "MORE FOG, PLEASE" about my 31 years as a director for community and high school musicals, was released on November 11, 2015.